


Stardust and Constellations

by loveindirtytrenchcoats



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 9.23 Coda, Angst, Caring Dean, Deathish, Drama, Dying Castiel, Episode: s09e23 Do You Believe in Miracles?, Hurt Castiel, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Major character death depending on interpretation, Not Really Character Death, Post-Episode: s09e23 Do You Believe In Miracles?, Post-Season/Series 09, Pre-Season/Series 10, Season/Series 10, Sick Castiel, Terminal Illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-01
Updated: 2014-07-01
Packaged: 2018-02-07 01:54:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1880703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveindirtytrenchcoats/pseuds/loveindirtytrenchcoats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>"And your Grace? What will you do about that? You</em> will <em>die if you don't replenish it."</em></p><p>It was a bright and early summer’s afternoon at the bunker, when beers had been passed around in the hazy heat of Lebanon, when Cas collapsed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stardust and Constellations

**Author's Note:**

> Basically my terrible way of dealing with Cas's state at the end of season 9.

The months had gone by slowly and painfully for the Winchesters and Castiel. The time had been spent trying to find some kind of cure for Dean’s… predicament, and over time they’d managed to carefully pull up some ways they could at least alleviate the whole _demon_ crap, but he was still not… _Dean_. Not completely, not yet. Sam was sure he was onto a full-blown cure, and Cas had been adamant about looking after Dean and doing any research possible in the other time he had spare- when the man would get angry at him for hovering and shout at him to “fuck off”, for example.

They’d been so busy that they hadn’t really thought much about the angel. Sure, they’d check he was alright- Dean, especially- but since when had they been good influences in the field of telling the truth and letting other people care for them? Cas hid things well. He didn’t used to- when he was still rebelling, still working out the ways of human emotion and fumbling with his actions and words, he was terrible at it. He hadn’t managed to hide things often- forgetting the whole Crowley and Leviathan business, of course. But while they were dealing with Dean? It had been a damn fucking good illusion. Cas brushed off the questions about him as if they were specks of dust on his shoulder, insisting that Dean was “ _more important than anything right now”_.

Dean just wishes he’d seen through the act earlier.

It was a bright and early summer’s afternoon at the bunker, when beers had been passed around in the hazy heat of Lebanon, when Cas collapsed.

They’d heard the crash easily from halfway across the bunker- something caving in, something huge and heavy hitting the ground with a colossal _bang_ that vibrated through the floor under their feet. Both brothers had only shared a worried glance before running at full speed to the site of the sound, guns out and ready for a fight. What they’d found, however, was not something they needed to attack.

Weapons instantly forgotten, the two men leaped into action.

It was in one of the store rooms where they’d found Castiel, sprawled out on top of fallen metal shelves, half of his body resting against the base and his limbs crumpled in front of him on the floor. Books and boxes of items had been flung across the dusty ground and lay in messy heaps all around. Cas was unconscious. At first glance, there seemed to be no visible sign of why he’d be in such a state. As Dean fell to his knees beside the angel, however, he noticed the milky pallor of his skin and the slight blue tinge to his lips caused by his apparent shortness of breath. As Dean pulled Cas’s body into his lap, cradling his head carefully, he quickly withdrew his hand when he felt the _slip_ of wetness on his dark hair. His palm was stained red.

There was too much blood for the time that had passed between him falling and them arriving. Sam said nothing as Dean desperately tried to wake their friend- after a minute of spouting gibberish and _CasnoCaswakeupnow_ endlessly, the angel let out a few jarring coughs and groaned while he gasped for breath that never seemed to come. He didn’t wake up. Dean watched a trail of blood sputter from his lips and splash onto his pale skin, and that’s when Sam spoke up.

“Dean, whatever’s happened, this isn’t good,” the younger brother said carefully, uncertainty and worry lining his voice. “This is more than just a trip and fall.”

“I know, Sam,” Dean said quickly, probably too harshly, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care. “He’s not hurt anywhere else, I don’t think- why is he not healing, why’s there…” Dean trailed off, gesturing weakly to the droplet of crimson liquid that marked a harsh line down his throat.

Sam helped Dean to quickly assess the rest of Castiel’s body, checking through his shirt that he hadn’t broken a rib or injured himself in any other way that could cause this much harm, but they found nothing. Cas’s breathing was pained and reedy, and the sound of it worried the brothers more than they could comprehend. _Just what the fuck was happening?_ After several more minutes of quiet in which Cas still made no response- not even to cough- Sam suggested what needed to be done. They managed to get a blanket and wrapped it around the angel’s shivering form, finding his skin cool to touch and getting paler and paler.

Dean lifted him bridal style with a grunt of exertion, Cas’s downy hair brushing under Dean’s chin, Sam getting doors for them and helping them to make it outside. Seconds after they were in the car Sam was driving, while Dean positioned himself with Cas in his arms in the backseat. The elder brother’s face was pale itself, worry and plain _panic_ written itself across his features as they drove way beyond the speed limit over miles of burning tarmac.

Once at the hospital, after handing an extremely out of it angel over to unsuspecting medical staff with grabby, forceful hands, Sam had to watch his brother pace the halls of the ER. They’d managed to grab some insurance files before they’d headed out, and thankfully they’d been papers that named Castiel as their brother, so there would be no danger of not being able to see him. Sam’s legs bounced up and down endlessly and streams of new people arrived and left the hectic department, but _still_ no news came through. Coffee was downed and shoes scuffed up and down the linoleum floors over and over again. The hours passed painstakingly slowly; Sam had resigned himself to sleeping lightly in a metal chair in the corner of the ER, but Dean continued to buzz with the caffeine in his veins and wouldn’t allow himself to rest.

Five hours after they arrived, a doctor finally came out. Both boys were up on their feet before their fake names had even finished being called and were heading towards the woman stood a few paces away from them, her hair frizzy around her face and her eyes tired. They gulped down lumps in their parched throats when she sat them down in the seats again, crumpling into one next to them. She spoke slowly and methodically, going through the rhythms and getting them to sign documents and permission files as she explained what had happened.

Dean became restless after ten minutes. The doctor- after some persuasion- led them along a few corridors and up an elevator, stopping outside the closed door of a room.

“He’s awake,” she said gently. “But he’s not feeling very well at all. He’s on multiple pain medications so he’s kind of out of it- not to mention the minor concussion. We’re keeping a very close eye on his condition, but I’m currently not seeing any signs of improvement.”

Dean winced. “Can we see him now?”

“Of course,” she smiled warmly, _pity_ written somewhere in her features. Dean ignored it. “Let me assure you that Mr. Wilson is in the best hands we can offer, and with you here too there’ll be more support for him. I hope that’s for the best.”

The brothers nodded, but neither liked the clinical and overly-soft manner in which she spoke to them. Cas couldn’t have been _that_ bad off.

Of course, that hope was smashed to smithereens as soon as they walked in.

Even though Castiel was awake, it didn’t make the picture in front of them any easier to look at. The angel was tucked up to his chest in blankets, the back of the bed elevated so that he could sit partially upright, his arms resting slackly by his sides and in a loose hospital gown. His eyelids were almost closed, resting under the harsh sterile lights of the room, and the Winchesters were drawn to his side immediately. Cas blinked open his eyes slightly when they each took seats on the right side of his bed, a small smile spreading across his pale features. His breathing was shallow and difficult, only supported by a cannula that ran under his nose; they could both see the mask that hung from a hook nearby, however, that Cas could reach for if he was in need of something more effective. A patch of gauze was taped across a shaven area on the back of his head, where stitches pulled together flesh that should have knitted itself whole again but had failed to do so.

Dean hesitantly took Castiel’s hand and leant forward towards the clinical sheets, mindful of the IV lines that ran into his arms that fed his weak body blood and nutrients. His smile grew a little at one side of his mouth as he locked eyes with the older hunter and blinked blearily.

“Hey Cas,” Dean said softly, rubbing his thumb tenderly over the warm skin of Cas’s hand.

“Hello, Dean.” Cas muttered quietly, his voice raspy and pained and so very quiet beyond his small gasps for air. “Sam.”

Sam nodded once with a small smile in response.

“So the doctor said your head didn’t stop bleeding for a while there, huh?” Dean said slightly awkwardly, moving around in the cheap seat and squeezing the angel’s fingers gently.

Castiel bent his head forward dazedly, the tiny smile still etched into the smooth planes of his skin crinkling the corners of his mouth slightly. The sun shone lazily through the short window of the room, bathing his features in the dimming orange of the evening and illuminating the room more kindly than the harsh lights that ran along the precise lines of the ceiling.

“What happened, Cas?” Sam asked softly. Dean recognised the tenderness there, the concern that his brother shared for the angel- sometimes that was strange for him, the realisation that it wasn’t all just _Dean-and-Cas_ , but that there were others involved too. It was easy for him to think of them as a separate… _entity_. Just like him and Sam were another.

Cas shrugged almost unnoticeably. “I fell.”

Dean recoiled at the word choice.

“That’s it, just- just _tripped_?” Sam’s eyebrows pinched tightly.

Cas blinked a few times but did not grace the question with any other acknowledgment, apparently focusing more on breathing deeply through his nose. They sat for a few minutes, only the beeping of the heart monitor and the heavy and deliberate breaths taken by the angel cutting through the thick fog of silence.

Sam reached into his pocket for his phone when it buzzed, scowled at the screen, and then tucked it back out of sight. Castiel’s eyes had slipped almost shut- the illusion of sleep- but the pain was painted in thick strokes across his clenched jaw; they’d been warned by the doctor that some of the drugs would wear off soon. And wasn’t that fucked up in itself? An angel was on meds to stop him from feeling pain.

“You been told about what’s going on with you, Cas?” Dean knew the answer was no, but he just wanted to check. Wanted to see that Cas didn’t know jack shit about what was happening to him and that he hadn’t been lying through his teeth when he’d said he was alright all those hundreds of times the man had asked.

Castiel looked thoughtful for a moment, despite his slightly glazed eyes.

“No.”

Dean could see the lie for what it was, but went along with it for the moment.

“You wanna know?” Dean sniffed loudly even though he didn’t need to, desperate to break the tension in the air. “Doc says we can tell you.”

Cas nodded hesitantly.

“Alright, okay,” Dean wiped a hand down his face and let out a long puff of air. “You had some scans while you were out of it.”

The angel seemed to understand that the scans had some significance to his condition, revealed something he probably already knew about but was unwilling to disclose. Only a flicker of recognition lit his pupils briefly, but was snuffed out of existence just as quickly.

“You got… You got burns, Cas,” Dean paused. “Everywhere. Doctors are crazy pissed about it, ‘coz they have no clue how. All inside your organs and everything.” He had to stop for a moment.

Sam cleared his throat and shuffled on his chair uncomfortably, but Cas kept his stare intently on Dean no matter what. He didn’t move, so exposed nothing.

“They don’t know how to treat you,” Dean went on. “Don’t know if this can ever be fixed.”

Cas kept fucking _staring_. Endlessly.

“What… What happened to you, Cas?” Dean was surprised himself at how his voice came out so desperate and so _afraid_ , and he almost flinched but managed to stifle it.

Cas didn’t answer the question. Instead, he said something profoundly shattering that shook the very ground beneath the brothers’ feet.

“I’m dying.”

Dean found that his fingers had instinctively clenched around Castiel’s, but, to his credit, he didn’t flinch at all. His gaze stayed steadfast and strong, and Dean fucking _knew_. He knew in that fraction of a second.

“You’ve known about this for months, haven’t you?”

That broke Cas’s stare. His eyes flickered downwards to look at where their hands were intertwined, but the man broke the contact quickly. Sam’s reaction was unseen by both of them.

“Jesus.” Dean muttered. “Jesus _Christ_ , Cas.”

“Dean-“

“No, you know what, Cas?” Dean stood up, the legs of his chair scraping against the floor as it skidded away from him. “Screw that. Screw _you_.”

Before Dean knew it, he was outside and kicking at some unimportant trashcan. Garbage shot out in different directions across the asphalt and the man hid his face from anyone that could see him. Black wasn’t really your average eye colour.

He breathed heavily when he finished, pressing his white-knuckled fist to his mouth to hold back his screams of frustration. Because fuck all of that. Fuck their shitty lives. Fuck _everything_.

Silent tears slipped down Cas’s pale face as he allowed Sam to pull him into a well needed embrace, and all the while Dean beat a metal bin senseless, wishing more than anything that he could be punching _himself_ over and over until he heard his own bones snap and his blood gurgle from his lips because he could’ve done something about this. He could’ve checked on the angel better, could’ve pressed him further for information. Instead, he had been worrying over himself. And _he_ wasn’t dying.

 _Cas_ was.

It was enough to force him to his knees.

Cas gasped raggedly and Sam had to help him breathe, pulling the mask from the side of the bed and explaining that his lungs were the worst off while pressing urgently on the _call nurse_ button.

Dean struggled to catch his own breath as he leant against a brick wall and watched the sun lower further to the horizon.

When night fell and Castiel was restlessly twitching in pained sleep, Sam searched, but Dean had disappeared.

 

* * *

 

A week later, Dean signed Cas out of the hospital AMA.

They gave him an oxygen tank and some particularly nasty foods that he would find easier to digest, but overall it was just a struggle. Everything was a struggle for him, seemingly.

Castiel had known what was happening to him. He’d known for long enough to have mentioned it, but- just as suspected- he didn’t want any attention to be taken away from the search for a cure for Dean. So he’d worked and he’d worked, continually losing his powers and growing weaker, but still he carried on helping without a word of complaint.

Dean would’ve liked to have been able to punch himself on any occasion where he doubted Castiel’s loyalty.

So here they are- back at the bunker with a dying angel, and just at the time when the planet seems to be at its most peaceful. _Winchester_ _luck_.

The angels are doing their own thing now, dealing with the consequences of all the wars and probably still fighting, but it doesn’t affect the humans, and that’s what matters. The demons have- for the most part- stowed their crap and settled down a little.

Over the course of the first few days they were in the hospital, several angels had visited with sincere expressions and cold but caring words. They had offered their graces, asking to be allowed to give them over to keep Cas alive longer.

He’d turned down every single one.

Seeing as they couldn’t be tracked in the bunker, the offers died away, along with much of the hope they all had of saving Cas. Each trail runs cold and each day the almost-human gets a little worse. He puts up a good front, but the brothers can easily see through it. He’s hurting, and he’s weak, and he truly is dying.

Most days are spent looking after him from a distance, but after five days of trying to be comforting from half way across the room, Dean crumbles.

It’s a quiet evening lying out on the sofa, home-made soup warming him a little, that Cas is joined by the older hunter. It’s tomato. It has rice in it, too.

Dean just slips down onto the couch with him, pressing their shoulders together so that he can feel the heat radiating off the man. There’s plenty of space open for him to sit further away. Cas is glad he doesn’t. They sit in silence for a long time, and it’s not uncomfortable- they’ve come to find security in the moments they have together where words are not needed, where feelings are pressed into the empty space around them that seems to extend into a chasm of unhappiness with small gestures and touches. They wrap themselves in those moments like they’ll never have them again, like they’re a life force that keeps them driving on through the harder days when Cas sits gasping for hours or won’t wake up because he’s just _so tired, Dean_. And he is. He sleeps a lot, and every day Dean goes to bed afraid that his friend won’t wake up.

Castiel finishes half of his soup and places the bowl down on the table, struggling as he bends over forward to keep breathing deep enough. He catches his breath quickly, though, which Dean is thankful for. He leans back into the cushions that surround him and turns his head lazily to face the man, watching him devour his food all the way to the bottom of the bowl. He blinks slowly, tiny twitches tugging at the edges of his slightly parted mouth. Dean licks his lips when he’s finished but there are still orange stains lining the edges of them, like they’ve been smudged with ink. Cas laughs. Loudly. He coughs a little after, but not too much. Dean is thankful enough that no blood comes up, as it has been doing more and more frequently.

Shuffling further down into the blanket he’s under, Castiel wiggles his eyebrows a few times at the elder Winchester, still no words being shared between them. Dean does his little snort-laugh where his head gets projected backwards slightly as he smiles. Cas finds it very endearing. Dean moves closer, edging up the folds in the fabrics and joining the warm body underneath them. The angel rests his heavy head on Dean’s shoulder, shutting his eyes and allowing all thoughts to blow away and sensation to take over.

He can hear Dean’s heart thumping strong through his body, and his stomach gurgling a little as it starts to digest his food. He turns his head so that he can gaze up at the man’s features, watching every movement of his skin and mapping out the freckles across his cheeks and nose as if recording the stars on an astronomy chart. Dean’s face is made up of a galaxy in itself. Every atom is made of stardust, and even though Cas can’t see each one anymore, he knows that the entirety of space is crammed into his thrumming cells. His soul used to be like that, too; it was a huge ball of light, so pure and beautiful. It had reminded Cas of stars burning up, of the stunning light show they created as they disintegrated into dust, and he only wishes he could still see it. Sometimes he thinks he can feel it, though, feel the warmth and the brilliance of it when Dean quietly shuffles into the room and gives him food or offers to do things for him. He thinks he can feel the entirety of space igniting against his side, where Dean is pressed close and comforting, thundering inside his bones and flaring with the radiance of a thousand suns.

The dark and rotting demonic part of him does not break the magnificence of his soul. That much Cas is sure of.

It would be like trying to put out a forest fire with a single bucket of water, Cas thinks.

Ineffective.

It’s why he fell in the first place, after all- not even what had happened in hell could stain Dean’s soul, and Castiel gave up everything he knew for that light that left such a blinding afterimage on his grace. Through everything they’d experienced- the apocalypse, betrayal and even death, they had both always been on a collision course that never seemed to keep them apart.

Cas thinks of all of this as he moves his hand up to brush at Dean’s cheek. The man doesn’t flinch or shy away, but a small tinge of pink rises into his skin. He leans into the touch, and Cas finds himself moving even closer, until their bodies are almost woven together under the blankets. Their hands join without a thought. They don’t go any further, simply because nothing more is needed.

In that second, Cas is sure he can feel their entire _beings_ intertwining in a curl of warmth that stretches across everything he knows, and he finally allows the sensation to burrow and pool deep in his chest. He never lets it go again.

 

* * *

 

Only a week later, Castiel can only walk short distances around the bunker and they still have no clues on how to save him.

While out on a supply run, Sam had been ambushed by a deranged angel who desperately tried to rip out his own grace and give it to the hunter. He’d managed to stop him and get out of there in time, but they were all still finding it difficult to cope with the devotion many angels had to Cas.

The days are much quieter than they used to be. Dean was angry, he was so _angry_ that he screamed to the endless stretch of blue skies for some miracle, he drank and drank and even avoided Cas sometimes. But the anger faded, the bargaining ended too, and he just settled.

Sam was always muttering shit about “ _the_ _five stages of grieving, Dean, just face it_ ”, but he always left the room when his older brother simply clenched his jaw and ignored him.

Dean had grieved enough times in his life to understand perfectly well how the process worked.

Cas sits in his room and reads books, but sometimes his eyes get too sore and the words get scrambled on the page, so he has to stop. Dean comes in one time to find the barely-angel cowering in the corner of the room, the curve of his back slammed hard against the point where the two walls meet. His hands are pushing hard into his eye sockets, painfully so, and Dean can see his entire body shaking as he slides to the floor.

A few metres away from him, a copy of Pride and Prejudice lies open with the pages dog-eared against the dusty floor, a single dent in the layers of yellowing paper where it hit something hard.

Dropping the mug in his hand to the floor, Dean runs to Cas’s side and doesn’t even hear the crockery shattering into pieces and the tea spraying out across the nearest wall. He grabs Cas into his arms, pulling him close and fighting off the pricks that sting up through his nose and behind his eyes as he listens to the wheezing noises coming from the slight frame held against his chest.

Cas tries to say “ _not real, no, not real_ ” over and over, but it’s mostly just his lips moving.

The almost-man’s back is pressed in a solid line to Dean’s chest, his hands soothing through brittle but soft, dark hair. The strands are too short around the back, uneven with the rest, and he lightly strokes the bump of gnarled flesh there.

“What’s wrong, Cas, what’s happened?” Dean asks quietly, closing his eyes tight.

Cas sobs out “ _I can’t read anymore, Dean, I can’t read_ ”, and an abyss cracks open in Dean’s chest. It gapes wide and endless, stretches for miles without falter.

That night, while Cas sleeps, he fills it with alcohol.

 

* * *

 

Three days after, Cas cuts his hand while helping to chop vegetables.

Two days after that, when they have to take him back to the hospital because he’s choking up blood and vomit like there’s an endless supply of the stuff, the doctor asks why they didn’t bring him in earlier for the slice in his hand that now needs five stitches.

Dean says “ _I didn’t know_ ”, and they don’t ask any more questions.

 

* * *

 

Thankfully, Cas still manages to eat some things when they get back to the bunker. He likes having crackers as snacks and _always_ enjoys tomato rice soup. He merits his enjoyment to the fact that he’s now so close to being human that he can actually _taste_ the food, not just the compounds that make them. That chills the brothers, because they know that as soon as Cas is human, he will die.

Although he does get nutrition, it’s easy to see that he’s lost a lot of weight. Mostly, they don’t notice the physical, more that he’s so tired all the time. Moving around too much is exhausting.

The mask of calm is back up. Cas has not had any adverse reactions to any bad situations caused by the strains of his condition since the book, but nor has he tried reading anything except the instructions on the plastic bottles of his medication. Dean can still read, though, out loud, and he finishes Pride and Prejudice in a day straight, finding peace in the tiny smile that Cas wears the whole time he’s talking. They listen to music a lot, too, because Cas’s hearing is still perfect. He likes the wartime jazz records that they have in the bunker, and he likes Dean’s music too. Cas says he would like to dance to Moonlight Serenade one day, but cannot find the strength to do so.

Sometimes he has nose bleeds, and Dean sits with him and holds bloody tissues to his face until they stop. Cas smiles occasionally when these things happen. It freaks Dean out.

One time, while Dean had been adjusting the flow of oxygen into Cas’s cannula, he had just started _laughing_. Dean had thought he was crying for a moment, but looked up to see that the angel’s face was creased with gasping laughter. He stopped soon after, but his eyes were foggy and Dean has to hope it was all because of the drugs. _It’s all because of the drugs_.

Dean takes Cas out for a drive one day, stopping not too far from the bunker and pulling out a blanket for them to sit on. The air’s fresh and clean and for the first time in a few days, Cas takes himself off his oxygen supply and breathes as deeply as he can, a lazy smile fixed on his sun bathed features. The soft light falls across his skin, and Dean can’t help but think that he truly is beautiful.

They eat cucumber sandwiches- wholemeal bread and everything- and Dean doesn’t complain for a moment. Castiel wonders what other things the man has changed about his behaviour for him over the years. Watching Dean’s nose screw up with distaste as he bites into the soft bread and crunches on the cucumber makes a wide, toothy smile emerge on Cas’s face. The hunter stops chewing, swallowing slowly as he takes in the expression and matches it on his own face for a minute or two, before they continue eating.

They watch the sky turn orange and the birds fly lethargically over the fields before deciding to go back. While they’re clearing up, Crowley soundlessly appears a few metres away. His hands are shoved deep into his coat pockets and his eyes are squinted, and he just watches them silently. Dean tells him to “ _fuck off_ ” while he folds the blanket up and puts it back in the trunk, but Cas steps closer to the demon and allows him to place something in his hand.

Crowley only says two words. He looks from Cas to Dean, face solemn, and nods. “I’m sorry.” Then he leaves.

Castiel doesn’t allow Dean to see what is now hidden in his jacket pocket. Not until 11pm that night, when they lie next to each other in Dean’s bed, fingers laced together. In his other hand, Cas reveals a glass vial attached to a metal chain. The hunter knows instantly what the swirling blue light inside the bottle is, and pushes himself up onto his elbow so he can look down on the angel. After a few minutes of silence, Castiel wordlessly sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed, and Dean does the same until they’re both in the same position next to each other.

Cas’s eyes are blank and wide as he stares at an insignificant point on the wall opposite him. Only one lamp is on in the room and the pale wash of light dances across the angel’s drawn skin, touching softly at the lines of his bared torso. The bags under his eyes are dark and heavy, and the pain line that sits across his brow has made a crease in his forehead that never seems to lessen. He holds the grace in both his open palms, the chain hanging down to the floor and swaying occasionally from side to side; the blue light cast from it illuminates him in an ethereal glow that suddenly makes him look a lot like his old, otherworldly self- the angel that could wipe an entire town off a map in a heartbeat or level mountains with one breath of air.

The illusion is broken when a single tear carves a pathway down his cheek.

“Whose is it, Cas?” Dean asks quietly, nudging his thigh closer to the angel’s.

“I don’t know.” Castiel admits, voice cracking with grief. “I don’t know, Dean. I can’t recognise my own family anymore.”

Dean cups Cas’s face with his calloused palm, stroking under his eyes and staring into those lost baby blues. His small smile doesn’t last, not when another tear slips out of Cas’s eye that he can’t catch with his fingers and wipe away before it falls to stain his lap.

“How much more can I lose, Dean?” Cas whispers, staring lifelessly, and Dean cannot find an answer.

 

* * *

 

Castiel deteriorates quickly after that. He seems to have given in more, accepted what is happening to him and letting it take its course.

He sleeps a lot, often tangled up with Dean’s bare limbs under a single sheet. They can’t have anything thicker because Cas is always so _hot_ , running a fever-like temperature all hours of the day. He’s like a fucking _furnace_ , and sometimes Dean has to get out of bed to cool himself down or grab wet cloths to try to get the angel’s body heat simmering lower than it is. His sleeping pattern is irregular. Sometimes he’ll fall into an almost comatose state, sleeping so deeply that his breaths are shallow and one of the brothers have to get him a mask instead of his cannula, because it’s simply not effective enough. Other times, he’ll toss and turn in light sleep that will wake him up, at _most_ , an hour after he’s fallen asleep, and it hurts Dean every time he has to soothe him back down onto the bed and hold a tissue to his face as he splutters blood.

He’s in pain a lot, too. They visited the hospital again- this time without Cas- but only Sam had managed to stay longer than ten minutes to listen to the words “ _final_ _stages_ ” and “ _preparation_ ” and “ _make_ _him_ _comfortable_ ” and shit like that. He’d sat back in the Impala with a crap load of medication and even an IV line and bags, and Dean had to cover his mouth with his hand. Sam asked if he was alright, and he’d said “ _of course I’m not fucking alright_ ”, and they’d driven the rest of the way in silence.

Castiel is sleeping when they get home, unsurprisingly, sprawled out on his front with one arm caught uncomfortably under his chest, the tubes tangled around his left leg. He’s taken up permanent residence in Dean’s room, leaving his empty and cold for weeks now, and apparently he has no plans to move back in. When he’s awake a bit later, Dean helps him into the bathtub and wipes his bruised skin down with a sponge, massaging shampoo methodically into his hair. He ignores the fact that a clump of the dark hair is stuck in the drain when they’re finished.

Sam asks if he is in pain- something Dean hasn’t really had the bravery to do- and he breathes out a hesitant “ _yes_ ”. He tells them it’s about a seven on a scale of ten, and Sam follows the doctor’s advice to set up an IV line with morphine for anything above six. It all makes Cas look a lot smaller than he did before.

Sam takes Dean into the kitchen and tells him he needs to eat more and take better care of himself, and it’s only then that the older Winchester realises he doesn’t remember the last time he ate a proper meal. He makes sure to do so that evening, in a place where his little brother can see him, before going back to his room and climbing into bed with Cas. The angel huffs contentedly and positions himself on Dean’s chest, his arm and leg spread haphazardly across the hunter’s body. He can feel the jut of Castiel’s hipbone and the ridge of his ribs through his skin, but adds that to the list of things he’s ignoring. They fall asleep so close that they have almost become one, and Dean prays for time.

Time to find _something_.

Something except the throbbing grace that sits in the bedside drawer, that he sometimes catches Cas reaching blindly for when he’s half asleep and groaning in agony.

Castiel wakes up covered in sweat at 3am, and as Dean helps him to breathe and stop coughing, he leans forward until his face is buried in the clammy skin of Dean’s neck, his fingers nestling in the sandy hair at the base of his skull. Wetness clings to his skin, and Cas sobs quietly, Dean’s arms wrapped around his back. For the first time, Dean cries too.

After a while, when they’ve changed position and are both calm again, Dean asks something he’s been wondering for a long time.

“Are you scared?”

Cas breathes in as deep as he can manage.

“No.”

 

* * *

 

The next night, they share their first kiss.

It’s gentle and sweet, and lasts for a minute before they stop, lie together and fall asleep.

 

* * *

 

The night after that, they kiss again, more fervently this time, and Dean speaks brokenly between pushes of lips.

“I’m scared, Cas,” he admits, and Castiel cradles his face. “I don’t want to lose you. Not again.”

Cas smiles. “It will be alright, Dean. _You’ll_ be alright.”

He holds Dean to his chest as the man cries.

“I’m sorry,” Dean murmurs under his breath.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” Cas soothes, his voice low and controlled, and they both marvel at how their roles have changed. “And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry too.”

 

* * *

 

Castiel doesn’t wake for over 24 hours after that.

They think this might be it, that this might be the final push. He’s thinner than ever now, and paler than his sheets except for the red flush that constantly covers his cheeks and chest. But it’s not the end. He wakes with an aborted shout at midday- 31 hours after he fell asleep- and doesn’t stop shouting for a long time.

Both brothers rush into the room at the same time, watching the angel writhe on his sheets and try to claw at his own chest and pull out his IV. Dean manages to soothe him enough to stop him from attacking himself, but Cas’s eyes are still wild and wandering the room frantically, as if he’s not really seeing anything. Tears flood his face and his eyes grow bloodshot quickly, and he wails into the silence of the bunker.

“It’s… gone, Dean, it’s _gone_!” he shouts as loudly as he can, gasping sobs escaping his chapped lips. “It’s gone, and… I’m… _empty_!”

“What’s gone, Cas, what’s gone?” Dean asks firmly, holding his wrists still and hoping his breathing will get easier.

“It’s gone,” he whispers this time, his chest shuddering with his weeps. “I’m _empty_.”

That’s when Dean gets it. Theo’s grace has finally burnt out. Castiel is completely human, and now he is suffering like one, too.

He’s quiet, then, his back against Dean’s chest, and he whispers “ _I lied, I lied, Dean, I lied_ ” and he cries again. He shakes, back heaving with his breaths, and admits everything.

“I lied. I’m scared. I’m so _scared_.”

“Shh, it’ll be okay, it’ll be okay, Cas,” Dean says, but it’s too late. He knows his words are lies, too. So he says something he knows is the truth. “I’m right here. I’ll be right here. With you.”

Cas passes out not a minute later in Dean’s arms.

Sam leaves the room, hand pressed to his mouth and something that sounds suspiciously like a sob escaping his lips.

The “ignore” list is obliterated until it’s nothing more than stardust.

 

* * *

 

Three days and two nights later, Cas can’t sleep.

Nor can he really stay awake.

He stares emptily at the ceiling, limbs loose at his sides, his gaunt body hidden under a swathe of blankets. He’s not hot anymore. He’d asked for his coat earlier, but they’d had to tell him that he’d never brought his trench coat back to the bunker. Cas couldn’t remember what he’d done with it.

Dean can no longer bear to lie with him, so instead sits a pace away from the bed in an armchair, occasionally sipping at some unknown drink. Sometimes he gets a reaction out of the man, but no words. He smiles occasionally, and Dean holds his hand and strokes his forehead carefully.

Sam joins him often, now, and they sit together in silence, just watching.

When Sam goes to get some food in the late Summer evening, not bothering to make anything himself, Dean is alone. Cas shuts his eyes and breathes, barely, and Dean cannot help but look over at the bedside table.

The vial still sits in there, a small glow shining around the edges of the drawer. He’s drawn to it like a moth to light, because _it could save Cas_. It could save his life _right now_. He wouldn’t die, wouldn’t leave Dean and never come back.

He remembers the conversation they’d had only days earlier, when Cas had told him why he didn’t want to use the grace even though the angel it belonged to was already dead. Dean didn’t get it at first- the grace would just go to waste if they didn’t use it, so why not buy them some more time to look for a solution? To get information on what happened to Castiel’s actual grace from Metatron? Or a way to remove the false grace without killing him?

But Cas had explained carefully. Above anything else, he didn’t want to have another angel’s grace inside him. He’d seen it for the mistake that it was the first time around, and couldn’t bear to have that feeling again. It always felt _wrong_ , he said, like he was having to use a different vessel that couldn’t contain him. Like an ill-fitting suit.

But he’d also solemnly revealed that he didn’t want to take the grace because he wasn’t sure it could last for as long as this one had, and he couldn’t take the suffering all over again. He didn’t want to _hurt_ anymore, he just wanted to have his peace. And Dean had said he’d understood, he accepted his wishes, and they put the vial in the drawer. _Out of sight, out of mind._

It wasn’t out of Dean’s mind anymore. He couldn’t take this, couldn’t watch his friend waste away this way, not someone who’d been so powerful and had done so much for him. The man who’d muttered about stars and constellations as he’d traced the curve of his jaw, kissed along the lines of his cheeks and each eyelid as if Dean was the most precious thing in the world. He hadn’t felt that way since he was four years old, nobody had even come _close_ to making him think he was worth something. But Cas had. He’d done it.

Castiel, an angel of the Lord, had found something worth saving inside Dean, inside the broken shell of a man he was and still feels like. Sometimes Dean still doesn’t believe that it happened, that this mighty being fell from grace for him and gave up everything he had, and it knocks him off his feet every time he thinks too hard about it.

Dean thinks of Cas’s gentle, long fingers and the way they explored the lines of his body, the hands that cradled his wounds and healed people in need. He thinks of the lips that said such powerful words- “ _you’re different_ ”, “ _I’m doing this for you_ ”, “ _I’m hunted, I rebelled, and I did it, all of it, for you, Dean_ ”, “ _to keep them away from you_ ”, “ _I’m sorry, Dean_ ”- and he can’t think of them not speaking again, of them not saying soft words to him and maybe even revealing more. He thinks of Cas’s eyes, the piercing blue gaze that he could never break that used to make him want to crawl out of his own skin, but the deep pools he’s now grown to adore so much, and he doesn’t like to think of them shutting and never opening again.

Most of all, though, Dean just thinks of _Cas_. He thinks of his power and his kindness, and his never ending mission to please Dean, to impress him and protect him and worship him and stay by his side always. And he thinks of how neither of them ever really seemed to manage it. Their broken personalities and inability to express any semblance of proper emotions, and he regrets it so much. He regrets never having acted on the feelings that were so painfully, obviously _there_ , just underneath the surface. And he hates himself for it.

Then he looks at the figure on the bed, the rise and fall of his chest, and he barely recognises him. And he wants to cry again. He doesn’t.

He looks over Castiel once more, already missing his eyes and knowing he won’t see them again this time. He leans down and presses a kiss to the cool forehead, squeezing his eyes shut tight to stop himself from bursting out with weeps of sorrow, and says “ _sorry_ ” over and over again to the skin there, hoping that somehow the word can seep into Cas’s body and mind and stay embedded there forever like a promise. He looks down on the face that he has fallen so strongly for, and he sees those smiles and those tender moments, and he remembers when Cas had said “ _I love you_ ” because he wanted Dean to know it before he wouldn’t be able to say it, and how they had kissed slow and long after that to the beat of the silence around them, and he crumbles.

Dean looks to the drawer again, away from the struggled breaths and the pain and the heartbreak, and he knows what he will do.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Leave a kudos or comment and gain my eternal love. Sorry if I hurt your feelings. Whether he dies or not is... up to you.
> 
> I listened to "Knocking on Heaven's Door" by Bob Dylan a lot while I was writing this.


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